- Thursday, 26 November 2009
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This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication - Western Union memo, 1876
Green Goblin launches volley of 790i Ultra and GX2
THE DAY DAWNED a slight tint of green as Nvidia let slip the dogs of war and editors around the world posted their reviews on both the 790i Ultra chipset and the Geforce 9800 GX2 two-headed monster.
The GX2 is probably what you’re looking for, as the 790i Ultra chipset isn’t as sexy a beast as its companion. Let’s recap some specs so you’ll situate yourself: the GX2 is a bit of a sandwich with two of everything in it, except the PCIe connectors. This is all wrapped in a special case that hides the tech away and simultaneously works to dissipate the extra heat.
Regarding performance – we’ve read the reviews - and the idea that you’re buying the ultimate graphics card just escapes us... sure it’s got the overall performance edge over its competitors (internal and external), but dropping a small fortune for a card that performs just a bit over a 8800GT SLI rig...
Yes, Nvidia can be happy it's got the leadership, even though it isn’t as absolute as it claims. There are always people looking for the ultimate graphics card, what they won’t find is a product with a future. The performance edge on these cards will be neutralized as soon as the 55nm shrinks come a-knocking in a quarter or two.
Well, read and weep, in no particular order at all:
Nvidia is also playing up the launch of the 7-series chipsettery, through the partner sampling of the 790i Ultra mobos. These are a genuine generation ahead of the original 780i series (which as someone put it, was a joke) – with DDR3 memory controllers and support for 1600MHz FSB CPUs – although it’s still only three-way SLI. You can match the 790i Ultra with a GX2, that’s the idea, but you aren’t limited to GX2. It’s a very neat, high-end chipset that’ll hit Intel quite strongly.
Here’s what we found on-line today:
Last but certainly not least, Eliot at Fudzilla slipped in this little (literally) review of an 8600 Phenom. Testing isn’t really going the way AMD would’ve wished. Power and performance are almost identical in the 8600 and 9600, which undermines AMD’s work even more – or makes the 8600 a perfect price/performance CPU. Your pick. Let’s see what develops from this. µ
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The 9800GX is a lot closer to two 8800GTS 512 than two 8800GT. The price is only a smidgeon higher than two of those.

Nvidia is obviously charging a premium because it's an expensive card to assemble and let's face it, they aren't going to sell them in bucketloads like the 8800GT.

So why would you buy one instead of getting 2 cards and doing old fashioned SLI? You might not have an SLI board, or you might want to go quad SLI (good luck with that...)

There is a market for the GX2, just a small one, hence the small (and it is small) premium to pay.

I do agree that there isn't much future for the GX2, which is why I will be replacing my crusty 7800GTXs with a nice 9800GTX until something truly new comes along.
Slackshoe,

Why would you even consider a stopgap and higher priced solution like the 9800GTX when we know it's going to be the exact same thing as the 8800GTS 512 OC cards? Do you like wasting money?

Also, I have nothing against the release of the GX2, but let's be real - the performance just isn't that great for the money, as it loses to SLI 8800GTS 512 in basically every single benchmark at every single resolution. Here in the good ol' USofA, you can find the 8800GTS 512 for $250ish all day long ($170 from Tiger Direct last week, AR). That's a pretty significant savings and you have slightly better performance and probably more overclocking headroom.
The 9800GTX has been shown to overclock a lot higher. And how do you know how much it's going to cost? I was under the impression that the whole 8800 series is pretty much now obsolete with the release of these cards, and the forthcoming 9800GT(S?)

Of course two 8800GTS 512 in SLI are gonna be a little bit faster than a 9800GX2, but as I said above, that may not be an option for people who don't have an SLI motherboard and want the best performance right now.
I guess I'm a bit confused as to why you thought 2 8800GTS's would be faster than the top of the line, flagship, wallet-buster 9800GX2. I mean, if you said 2 9800GTSs, I'd still have to be like, "wait, you mean the 9800GTX in SLI, right?"

I'm shocked that by a last-gen, higher end mid-range card in SLI is able to match (and sometimes beat) the new beast on the block.

This seems like a cruel joke on all of us who've been patiently waiting since August for the new series of cards to hit. I was more than willing to shell out $400+ for a new badass card, but if I've learned anything from the onslaught of benchmarks the last couple of days, is that the 8800GTS is a beast on the cheap and is a much better buy than the 9800GX2.

Of course nothin', this is a failure to out-pace the last generation and that's about all there is to say. They should've debuted the 9 series with the G92, since that's all these new cards are anyways (but with a much higher pricetag). Disappointing...